Monday, February 12

annual trip to snowshoe west virginia

Last week we made our annal trip to Snowshoe West Virginia to do a little skiing. On the day of our travel we unfortunately were hit with a Winter Weather Advisory throughout Virginia and West Virginia. Our driving started out dry for about 20 minutes and then rained and rained and rained until Virginia. Once we passed the Virginia line it turned it turned to freezing rain. Our rearview mirrors had at least a 1/2 inch thick glaze of ice on them for a good while (no joke). A little melting occurred and once we hit 64 in West Virginia, things really turned south. Freezing rain, turned wintery mix to snow.... Just a hot mess! Cars were pulled off the side of the road, cops out helping, etc...

Thankfully Joe feels fairly comfortable in these kinds of conditions AND the car we drove JUST had new tires put on a few months ago. Not that anyone should drive in these conditions unless they have to, but I'm so grateful that the Lord got us there safe and sound.

Travel Day

Day #1 Skiing

Joe was in charge of the camera (phone) as it was too cold for me to want to take my hand in and out of my glove to make a photo. I choose my battles wisely.

Thankfully the day priors weather brought a TON of snow to the slopes! I don't think we've ever skied there with such amazing powder (and low crowds).

It snowed in the morning and the afternoon brought beautiful blue skies!

Day #2 Skiing

Day two of skiing was another great day. It was overcast the entire day, low crowds and great conditions.

Our first stop was the Western Territory on the other side of the mountain (more advanced terrain) to ski for the morning. We literally skied in the clouds all morning as you will note below. Which led to a lot of freezing mist...

Which then led to a frozen jacket...

Literally...

For the afternoon we skied back on the other side of the mountain.

Day #3

Our last day at Snowshoe we had planned to ski all day. We woke up to freezing rain. We decided as we had already bought 3 day lift tickets, we were going to ski for part of the day anyways. So we threw on our ski gear, ponchos in tow and out we went (no photos were made due to the rain). We were the first (and only) people on the slope for a bit. For good reason. As we were going down a lot of the slopes were still roped off, apparently the main lift (where our lodging was) was frozen! So we were directed (via rope) down to the opposite side of the mountain. After about 2 hours of skiing in the rain we decided we were both wet enough that it was time to head out. Plus at that point, all of the advisories were lifted for our travel home.

When Joe pulled the car around it was literally a THICK sheet of ice! The entire car... We still had to pack up the car which gave us time to heat up the windows, to then break up the ice. Fortunately the roads home were just fine, but a lot and I mean a LOT of rain...